How cute. It's embarassing for me to go back to old threads and see what I was trying to pass off as wit at the time. One year from now I'll look back at this sentence and groan. That's a good thing, too. It means I'm satisfying the bare minimum requirement for my first resolution.

The second one is trickier. This year saw me at a new height of activity, but it's also the first year I've gained weight. Pop assures me that I will inherit his belly by age 28. Granted, I've only gained 5-10 pounds and an inch on my waist, but avalanches start small.

I'm working hard to eliminate artifice and pretension from my wardrobe. It's sort of a migration back towards my old Zen aesthetic. More buttons, fewer faux-nostalgic (I'm not even old enough!) Adidas track jackets.

So, my resolutions for this year:

1. Hesitate less

I spend too much time waiting for .. more time. This is sort of an inner child resolution. When I was a kid, I could fit 3 basketball games, homework, writing, random exploration AND afternoon cartoons into those sweet 5 hours between school and bedtime. Now I'm lucky if I get 2 things done on my day off.

2. Exercise

This is probably the biggest step in the oblivion of adulthood. Alack, alas, the dreaded "lose some weight in the new year" resolution. A timeworn cliche, yet completely relevant. Maybe my resolution should be "Go wicked fast on my bike" instead.

I know it's torture, but how did the rest of you do in 2006? And what are your aspirations for 2007?_________________QED, sort of.

I appreciate it too; I appreciate it even more when it fails though, so I can feel better myself. So don't get too witty or I'll have to cancel what I pretend to be is our friendship because it loses its raison d'etre.

Life is going kinda fast lately. So much stuff happend in 2006, it's incredible. I am 20 now....geeeezzz.

Anyway, old max said:

- Manage to get into Art school and study ID > (Yup. I made it. Hah!)
- Get experience in the Real World out there. > (I messed up my car in a crash, so that's enough real world. I gonna *hide again at sijun - LOL)
- Do stuff. Reading, Drawing, Painting, Writing, playing piano > (That's pretty much what life is about for me,...I think I'll never stop trying to be more active in these fields...so, yeah, I made quite some stuff, not enough tho : )

Newyears resolution:

- Be a nice human being
- Get a nice muse - also called girlfriend...oh well,...I might become melancholic instead.
- Get inspired - do art - be creative - improve - as always...find all the nonexistent keys to be a master of art
- ,......"feel" more. Yay. That sounds weird. Life is deadly monotonous sometimes. I want to experience and FEEL more...

I painfully remember (or try to) the time around spring/summer when I was drunk nearly every day. A 3 month long party. On work days. Went out of the office, bought some beer, started drinking, fell into the sweet sea of numbness, recovered, called friends, went out, drank more, fell asleep. I tell you guys, that wasn't worth nothing. I lost so much money, and earned nothing.

Next came the big depression. Didn't go out, lost nearly all my friends. I'm not yet sure if that was a bad thing tho. But at the same time, I started painting again, bought a wacom (money from not going out every night).

My retrospect about what life has been in 2006: Process: Zero. Experience: +100.

Resolutions (guidelines):

- Get some new friends, the kind of people you actually want to spend time with
- Be more active. Fight indolence.
- Enjoy life.
- DARE!
- Nudge less ('Ma tells me she's pissed off by my constant nudging, and looking back at what I wrote... Hey she's right!)

I wish you all health, happyness, luck and success in 2007, my friends.

"getting a girlfriend" and "doing more art" is, seriously, a very bad combination

i never really cared about new years resolutions, but trying to further develop myself in art is constantly something i'm thinking about, it's just there all the time. also, being a good father is important (duh)

Oh man, it's that time of the year again, eh? It's always such a torture, yet we do it anyway...

FOR 2006:
Get a new job after moving back to the States--either art director or concept artist for games.

Still working on that. I had a few offers, and for one reason or another, did not pan out. At one point I accepted an offer and was about to move to Burbank, but then the CEO never gave the final nod, even when the managers were all ready to take me on. No one knows what the CEO is thinking. Thank God I managed to get some freelance gigs during 2006 though (Spiderman 3 and Surf's Up for Sony Pictures, The Spoils for Tenacious Games).

Sign the contract for the mural project in Napa (two of them for the exterior of a hotel).

I ended up turning it down. The people in charge was in the middle of a civil war, and I did not want to get caught up in it. Also, $20,000 for what they were asking for is way too cheap.

Make the Gnomon DVD's (early stages of talking--nothing's set yet).

Gave them the outlines and they seemed interested, but they did not follow up and neither did I. I should contact them and ask if they're still interested.

Nail the workshop for CGOverdrive2006 in Singapore (never done one in front of 1,500 people, so I hope I don't pee in my pants).

I think I did pretty well. I had a lot of people come up and tell me my workshop was their favorite. I watched a video of my workshop a few weeks later and found only a couple things I wish I had done differently, but otherwise I think I nailed it. (And no peeing in my trousers!)

Aint gonna happen until I settle down with a nice job. Freelancing is too erratic and I can't afford to spend money on stuff I don't "need" (relatively speaking, but this will change--I'll talk about it later). I did add a Novation ReMOTE 25 SL and a 750GB hard drive to my setup though. Both were purchases I'm pretty happy about. Oh, and the Mackie's will probably get swapped out for the JBL LSR4328P's.

Become a better drummer.

Have to wait until I get a new job and find a bigger place that'll fit the drum set.

Compose at least one full-blown orchestral piece I'd be proud of.

Only had time to compose some WIP's, but nothing finished.

Finish more digital paintings.

Did some, but nothing I'm too proud of.

Finish at least one oil painting I'd feel good about.

That's no longer a priority.

Ok, so here's the 2007 list:

1) Help Elena get her driver's license and become a good driver, so I won't have to be worried sick every time she gets behind the wheel.

2) Help Elena get up to speed with her English so she doesn't have to play mute/deaf every time we go hang out with my friends.

3) Find a stable, full-time job that I will like and feel the pay/benefits are worth the time/energy I devote to it.

4) Continue building my home recording studio (now I can say that I "need" the missing pieces for legitimate reasons--see below).

5) I just signed a contract to compose the score for my first video game, so I need to complete my recording studio to make the whole experience smoother. This will be my first time composing the score for anything, and it's something I've always wanted to do (I used to write songs for record companies, but I didn't particularly enjoy that. Scoring is more of what I like).

6) After settling down at a new job/new place, I'd like to schedule photo sessions with some models for a few shoots that'll take my photography to the next level. I've been shooting nothing but candids and casual stuff all of last year, and I miss shooting more formal sessions.

7) If I get the art director job I'm interviewing for at the moment, I'd like to not disappoint my boss and be the best art director they've ever hired.

Get off my lazy ass and exercise. I'm hoping lots of drum practicing will do it, but I'm guessing playing drums isn't enough--I'd need to do something that involves more parts of the body.

After much more introspection, I'm also thinking that I need to make one more resolution, a challenge for the ages.

3. Be Punctual

Seriously, I don't think I've ever been on time. I was even late with this thread. I'm 15-30 minutes late to work every day. My girlfriend lives 2 minutes away, and it still takes me 2 hours to drive over there. It's turning into a crisis for me, and I need to correct this malady. So, this is it. The crux. The turning point. I'm not going to be late anymore starting. . . .. . . . .now.

Also, with even MORE introspection, I'm now starting to think that more than I want a large format camera, I want a DSLR. I'm thinking a Nikon D40, since they're dirt cheap and have gotten great reviews. But any further deliberation on my part would count as hesitation, so I'm probably just going to make an impulse buy in the next few weeks..._________________QED, sort of.

Impaler - It's so scary how similar we are. Are you sure you're not my long lost brother or something?

If you have enough compelling reasons to upgrade to a more serious camera, then don't hesitate. I did and what a difference! I mean, if you look at the Olympus C3030Z gallery and the Canon 1D Mark II gallery on my site, you'll see a huge difference. But then again, I had saved for well over a year to get a serious camera, and it was only after I had already hit the ceiling with my precious camera--I was trying to do things that it cannot handle, so the only way to go was up. You don't even have to be super passionate about photography to justify a DSLR--just the desire to want really pretty photos of your loved ones, vacations..etc is enough reason. Of course, you can take beautiful photos with a compact too, but the experience of shooting one just isn't all that fulfilling. Compacts have very slow reaction time, response, fiddly menus, lack of fast and full manual controls, ridiculously vast depth of field (to a fault), and horrible high ISO performance (not to mention typically bad dynamic range as well).

To become the best person I could be..... To improve my rendering and basic drawing skills to a point where I can throw down an idea in a few strokes... Hit up some sort of quicky art school. TO kick ass at every thing else

But, yeah about the cameras. I made a conscious decision about two years ago to skip buying a good DSLR for a few years to come. Since then I've been shooting most of the time with a Nikon F100, some of the time with 23 year-old manual focus FE2 (for that Leica feel) and once in a great while with an F6. Now, as far as I've read and seen, slow 35mm film like Velvia and Provia still whips the pants off the best DSLR's if you're shooting stationary stuff or portraits. Unfortunately, Provia also retails for 13 bucks a roll here in town (no doubt thanks to the digital revolution), which makes it entirely impractical for Funsaver snapshots and just random little shots that aren't really worth the money to process.

Which is where the D40 comes in. It's not so much about a step forward, since both the F100 and the F6 are more advanced than a D40. I'm just tired of wasting the money and time developing and printing (not to mention 25 minutes to drop off and pick up) throwaway snapshots. I've had compacts before (all of my outdated website was shot with a Canon Powershot A80), and you're right. They're completely unsatisfying. So I want a light-duty, easy-to-use, cheap DSLR. Total price for a D40 kit is just over $600 after tax. I figure I would recoup the costs from film savings alone in a liberal two years.

I want a 4 x 5 camera for the complete opposite, though. A lot of my shots are artsy fartsy; tripod-mounted, fastidious exposure, looking-at-nothing-and-trying-to-say-something. 35mm and digital just don't have the resolution that I crave, and all that automated convenience tends to make me rush and end up with sloppy photos. You have to slow down with a 4 x 5, though. Just setting up the camera takes a good 10-15 minutes. Focusing takes another 15-20 minutes. Exposure is about the only thing easy to calculate. In exchange for this slow pace you get total image control, with resolution good enough to fool your eyes. There are no cheap parts to break on a 4 x 5, no crappy servos whining at you. The camera is very much a tool, a precision-made work of art. I'm not talking about specific brands, either; they're all great. 10 minutes using one will make you wonder how you ever took even a single photo with your stupid SLR lens stuck parallel to your image plane. The problem is price. A new Horseman goes for about $4000, before tax. That's without a lens, which typically start at $800 bucks a piece, used. Film is about $3 a sheet, another $2 to process. Film holders are 100 bucks a pop. I'd need a $500 Epson to scan it all in, too. So let's go down an ideal grocery list for a barebones 4x5 setup.

I wouldn't say that the Velvia and Provia films still kicks DSLR's ass, since there are color profiles you can get that will get you a very similar look in terms of color. As far as fine grain and resolution, I don't think you can really tell once the DSLR reaches 6MP. Today's DSLR are about 8~10MP, and all have excellent high ISO performance--this is something film just can't touch for both convenience and performance.

Shooting a 4x5 is a whole different matter though--medium format DSLR is still quite expensive--you'd have to spend several thousand to just get close to that resolution. But for those that can afford it (commercial photographers doing product/fashion..etc), most have switched by now (typically Leaf, Phase One, or Canon 1DS MKII).

For my needs, I don't really need a medium format. I don't ever print huge posters--at most 24x30. I also love shooting in all situations, so my camera needs to be ultra fast in response time and AF accuracy, that's why I picked the Canon 1D Mark II. At 8.5MP, I can still make a pretty nice print of a landscape shot without feeling like I'm being limited by the camera. In general, I do have a preference for performance over resolution. I love being able to AF as fast as the best sports photographers in the world, and capture as much as they could--it makes candid shooting and street shooting very fulfilling and fun. The precious moments I was able to capture with my 1D MKII probably would've been lost if I had picked a different camera.

Something like the D40 is pretty good for general all-around shooting. You won't get that medium format resolution, but the image quality is good and the high ISO performance is great. The rest is just lens choices--which since you shoot Nikon film cameras, you're already covered. (And Nikon's lenses are great.)

I dare to say that Velvia is still the best regarding colors. I dont care about grain and resolution of it. Just look at the colours. No profiles are enough to satisfy digital files to beat such wonderful Fuji films. No filters or such can beat Tri-x films with best DSLR It's just about looks which are very hard to control.

For medium format analog camera, I considered for Koni 6x7 but I backed out because the cost of sheets and no time. It was long time ago..

For last, I dont think canon focus is the best in the world. Just enough good but not the best

I dare to say that Velvia is still the best regarding colors. I dont care about grain and resolution of it. Just look at the colours. No profiles are enough to satisfy digital files to beat such wonderful Fuji films. No filters or such can beat Tri-x films with best DSLR It's just about looks which are very hard to control.

For medium format analog camera, I considered for Koni 6x7 but I backed out because the cost of sheets and no time. It was long time ago..

For last, I dont think canon focus is the best in the world. Just enough good but not the best

Have you seen the DXO Optics Pro Filmpack? They look pretty good to me. But it's hard to say unless you compare the output to a film version directly.

About Canon's AF - There's gotta be a reason why Canon's pro bodies and lenses dominate all the sports events--from the Olympics, Wimbledon, to just about every event out there, including Hollywood red carpet events. It's a common joke among sports/PJ photogs that when you attend public events, you see a sea of white Canon lenses, and there'd be a small minority of Nikon or other shooters sticking out like sore thumbs.

The reason may not be as obvious as you'd think. As far as AF accuracy and speed goes, Nikon and Canon are neck and neck. Canons may be a microsecond faster and Nikons are 2% more accurate, but unless you're shooting the world's fastest man from 2 feet away, the results are going to be the same. I suspect the real reasons are:

1. Aspiring photographers see the white lenses, they think "white = pro." Canon even has an ad campaign that talks exactly about this. When your income depends on making a safe bet, go with the flock.

2. Canon's lenses are around two grand cheaper than Nikkors in most cases. Canon's best lenses top off around $6000, while the Nikon equivalents sell for $7000 and up. Nikon even sold a 300mm f/2 back in the day for a measly sum of $20,000. The money you save with buying Canon could get you a pro f/2.8 wide zoom or another camera body. That's just smart shopping.

Yikes, I've hijacked my own thread again. You've made some really good points, Lunatique. They've made me think about my habits and conception of photography. I'd love to carry on this conversation with you, but maybe in another thread? :D_________________QED, sort of.

Well, since my resolutions last year were kinda lame, this year my resolution is to not make any resolutions and at the beginning of next year, guess what I was resolved to do that previous year and say that I was 100% successful in meeting my goal. I am under too much pressure as it stands.